1. Technical Field
This invention relates to perfusion aided meat processing and, more particularly, to a process for tenderizing, flavoring, or cholesterol, sodium or fat extraction in a recently slaughtered meat providing animal through a fluid perfusion process.
2. Description of the Prior Art
Various processes are known for injecting meat-producing animals with chemicals to produce various desired results. For example, Hood, U.S. Pat. No. 4,016,293, discloses a process for improving the color stability of fresh meat by parenterally administering a massive dose of an ascorbate to the animal, allowing distribution of the ascorbate through the vascular system of the animal and then slaughtering the animal. Likewise, Kang et al., U.S. Pat. No. 3,818,106, discloses a process of tenderizing meats by injecting an enzyme into an animal's vascular system while the animal is alive, wherein the enzyme is reactivated at a controlled rate by naturally occurring reducing agents present in the animal's blood.
Neither of these inventions, however, addresses the major problem encountered in perfusion aided processing. The problem is that once an animal is injected, the animal must be held alive for a time sufficient to obtain uniform distribution of the chemical administered throughout the animal system. Of course, obtaining uniform distribution of the chemical in this manner is frequently impossible due to the nature of the animal's circulatory system. This results in undesirable delays in processing and quality changes of the meat. Furthermore, as mentioned in Kang, U.S. Pat. No. 3,818,106, injection of many commercially available enzymes into a live animal often causes internal hemorrhaging and edema of the internal organs. For this reason, various specialized enzymes have been developed to attempt to avoid these undesirable side effects, but these modified enzymes may not be easily obtainable by meat processors around the world or completely avoid the undesirable side effects of the alive treatments.
Furthermore, injection of an animal weighing up to 1,000 pounds can and sometimes does result in the animal reacting violently to the injection, which may cause injury and/or damage to persons or property nearby. The injected animal may also inflict injury to itself, which may cause damage to some of the meat which the animal will produce.
All of the above mentioned problems could be easily solved if a process were known which would allow perfusion of chemicals into an animal's circulatory system following the slaughtering of the animal. There is at present, however, no such process. There is therefore a need for such a process.
Several examples of postmortem perfusion processes are found in the prior art, such as Bernhardt et al., W088/06003 and Schotte, U.S. Pat. No. 2,767,096. While the methods of Bernhardt and Schotte may be used for postmortem perfusion of chemicals into an animal's circulatory system, both Bernhardt and Schotte require substantial modification to the slaughtered animal in order to properly administer the perfusion fluids. For example, the process described in Bernhardt involves using a slaughtered animal which has portions of the limbs thereof removed to allow for drainage of the perfusion of fluid from the legs. Schotte teaches an even more extreme modification of the slaughtered animal before perfusion can begin. In Schotte, the description of the pre-perfusion preparation of the animal for arterial injection procedure covers almost three entire columns in the Schotte patent. Some of the steps which are included are the severance of the head, separation of the pulmonary artery from the aorta, removal of the trachea, esophagus and of the lungs, removal of a portion of the rectum-colon and emptying of the entire abdominal cavity. During each of these steps, special care must be taken to prevent damage to arteries and veins within the cavities, and in fact some severed arteries and veins must be clamped to prevent fluid flow therethrough. It is clear that the methods of both Bernhardt et al. and Schotte involve extensive preparation of the animal carcass before beginning perfusion, which substantially increases the time needed to perfuse the carcass. There is therefore a need for a perfusion process which may be administered to a slaughtered animal almost immediately after slaughtering of the animal and without requiring substantial modification of the animal carcass before beginning the perfusion process.
Therefore, an object of the present invention is to provide a process for post-mortem injection of a meat-producing animal.
Another object of the present invention is to provide a process which may tenderize, flavor, or cholesterol or fat bind and/or extract from meat or remove sodium through perfusion of substances into and through a meat-providing animal.
Yet another object of the present invention is to provide a process for perfusing meat which will not change the appearance of meat.
Still another object of the present invention is to provide a process for perfusing meat which may be easily implemented in any meat processing plant.
Another object of the present invention is to provide a process for perfusing meat which includes the step of heating the perfusion fluid to approximately the body temperature of the animal before introducing the fluid into the animal.
Another object of the present invention is to provide a process for perfusing meat which does not require substantial modification of the slaughtered animal and, in fact, teaches away from severing of limbs or removal of viscera as time-consuming and unnecessary.
Finally, an object of the present invention is to provide a process for tenderizing, flavoring, cholesterol or sodium extracting or fat binding of meat through perfusion which is inexpensive, cost effective and adds little time to the processing procedures.